


(around the world and back again) hope you’re waiting at the end

by flustraaa



Category: Shadowhunters (TV), The Shadowhunter Chronicles - All Media Types, The Shadowhunter Chronicles - Cassandra Clare
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Anxious Alec Lightwood, Best Friends to Lovers, Gen, Light Angst, M/M, Nervous Magnus Bane, Oblivious Alec Lightwood, Oblivious Magnus Bane, Panic Attack, i love Cat, shes an angel, theyre in love awe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-11
Updated: 2019-07-11
Packaged: 2020-06-26 05:18:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,281
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19761391
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flustraaa/pseuds/flustraaa
Summary: “you’ll break his heart you know.”“he has one of those now?”





	(around the world and back again) hope you’re waiting at the end

Magnus doesn’t quite discern he’s falling in love, teetering precariously on the edge until he stumbles into the yawning chasm. 

So naturally, he meets with Catarina about the sudden realisations that have dawned upon him in the past few days. 

“This is an idiotic plan,” Cat hisses, grabbing Magnus’ arm and immediately retracting all space he’s managed to cover towards the door, “You cannot tell him you don’t want anything more! and you especially cannot say unless it’s a strictly friends with benefits relationship!” 

Magnus takes her hand, slipping it off of his arm, “First of all, I am a Harvard graduate, I am not idiotic.”

She sends him a withering stare and he feels his next words stutter slightly, before they return strongly

“It’s fine, he doesn’t feel what I feel,” and if his voice cracks, he certainly hopes Catarina doesn’t say a word. 

That hope, however, falls through, “Magnus. He does. I assure—“ she murmurs softly, voice sympathetic, only to be abruptly stopped by Magnus incoming swarm of questions. 

“Did he tell you that?” His words, though hopeful, carry an undertone of spite that allows Catarina to see the all-too-familiar way he carries a heart on his sleeve. 

“Not... per se,” She mumbles, “But the way he looks at you when you don’t know, the way he voice gets gentler around you— there’s very minuscule details that those around him notice. He loves you, you can’t do this. You’ll break his heart.” 

“He has a heart?” Magnus blurts, frustrationpeppering through his veins as he thinks of the patterns that never seem to be clear to Magnus. 

“Magnus,” She gapes, “You were there when Emmanuel Briggs broke his heart after he got accepted into law school. Never in my life have I ever seen him cry like that.” 

Silence lapses between them, and Catarina sighs, pulling Magnus onto the sofa beside her. 

“ _Sweetheart_ ,” She coos, the motherly tone she’s begun to embrace far more since adopting Madzie, “Alec has never looked at anyone the way I see him look at you; not even Emmanuel.” 

And if Catarina leaves out that Alec has drunkenly blurted that Manny broke up with him because he was too attached to Magnus for comfort, Magnus never has to know. 

“Okay,” He mutters shakily, “You better be right.” 

“I’m seldom wrong, sweetheart,” She replies, running a comforting hand over his back 

“Hey,” Alec beams, meeting Magnus at the door of his apartment, “I feel like it’s been ages, let me get you something to drink.” 

Magnus only finds himself nodding, fiddling with his ear cuff. His eyes are trained on his shoes as he slips them off, so much so that he misses the frown that pulls down at the edges of Alec’s smile. 

When Magnus looks up, Alec is already across the apartment, opening a bottle of wine he’d opened for Magnus during their last date— no,movie night, not date. 

“You seem...” Alec pauses, moving a hand vacantly over his shoulder, “... _frazzled_?”

Magnus nods, slipping his hand under the wine glass before taking a long slow sip. “I’m fine.” 

He watches at Alec twists swirls the wineglass— the stem settled between his index finger and middle finger— biting the inside of his cheeks absently.

The cautious words slip from Magnus mouth before he can stop himself, “Are you alright, sayang?” 

Alec’s eyebrows furrow, and Magnus can practically hear Alec weighing the outcomes of whatever decision he makes in his head. He finally settles on one, and by god, it’s the one Magnus was praying he would ask. 

“Have you been—“ his voice cracks, and he clears his throat before continuing on hoarsely, “Have you been... avoiding me?” 

His cerulean eyes don’t dare glance away from the red Pinot Noir— in fact Magnus’ heart seems to still in his chest when his ever restless best friend is completely still. It’s the kind of rigidity that immediately brings Magnus back to high school when Alec stood so tightly strung; bearing the weight of his secret every day— scared it would destroy the world he knew. It’s the version of Alec he would never wish to see again, no matter how much he loved him then as well. 

“Yes,” he finds himself breathing out , as if the secret were a sigh he’s been holding in. 

Alec’s lashes flutter over his cheeks and his head lulls listlessly foreword, and it becomes clear to Magnus in that moment that if he doesn’t provide and explanation, his best friend will find every and anyway to burden himself with what he might have done wrong. 

“I...” the words hitch in Magnus’ throat, and he glances down at his own wineglass, only to find that Alec is staring at him with this striking azure eyes, “I think I’m falling in love with you.” 

Alec doesn’t say anything, blinking owlishly at Magnus thrice before glancing back down at his glass. What Magnus doesn’t see is the way Alec grips the counter to stable himself, and affirm that he is in awake and in this exact milestone of life. 

“I’m falling in love with with you,” Magnus repeats, voice firmer but still wobbling with the onslaught of unchecked emotions, “I’m in love with you. That’s why I’ve been avoiding you.” 

“Oh,” Alec blurts, for lack of better word, immediately turning his back to Magnus, covering his face with his hands as he faces the cabinets at his eyes level, “Cool.” 

“Are you gonna...” Magnus inhales deeply, eying Alec’s full glass of wine, “Are you gonna say something or am I gonna have to down this wine and sprint away.” 

“I’m... I’m thinking,” he mumbles, folding down to rest his elbows on the marble countertop, taking a few steps back before resting his head on his arms and catching his breath. 

“Are you alright?” Magnus mumbles, pulse jumping as she realises that this is, in fact, the pre-panic attack position his best friend has taken seven too many times for Magnus to not know exactly what’s going on. 

“Yeah,” He wheezes, “I’m _swell_.” 

“Alec—“ Magnus takes a few steps foreword, breaking up the space between him and extending his hand before retracting at Alec’s muttered negation. 

“One second. I can...” He pauses, swallowing, “I just need a second to catch my breath. It’s fine.” 

Magnus nods, taking a step back, resting his hip against the counter as Alec trembles. 

What feels like years pass before Alec breaks his head away from his knees— at some point he’d slipped down to the floor, Magnus following in suit across from him with plenty of space between. 

“Would now...” He licks his lips, blinking his eyes to a close before opening them and glancing up at the ceiling dazedly, “Would now be a bad time to tell you that I didn’t... I didn’t think you’d ever feel the same.

“Glitch in the matrix?” Magnus inquires, eyes still focused on Alec. 

“Precisely,” He grunts out, shaking his head. 

But then Magnus recognises the implication, and he snaps to life, “Wait feel.. feel the _same_?” 

Alec nods, pressing a hand to his chest— of where his head must be beating sporadically, before stammering, “Yeah. Loved you for a while. Still do.” 

Magnus closes his eyes, laughing quietly, “We’re idiots, huh?” 

“As Izzy so kindly reminds me every morning,” He mumbles, reaching haphazardly for Magnus’ hand before sinking down against the stove. 

“Hey, Alexander?” Magnus sussurates, earning a hum of response before he continues, “Do you want to go on a date with me?”

And the exhausted snort and affirmation he receives in response, is well worth the wait of the years it took for them to realise their feelings. 


End file.
